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Apple 'Records Every Tap' in App Store to Filter New Personalized Recommendations Feature

This is part of why I’m always hesitant with the iPad-only lifestyle many on social media & YouTube seem to be promoting (kind of heavily, have to wonder who is financially pushing it).

Apple owns that store and puts whatever they want on it (and disallows anything they do not like). It is a completely locked system and for a main device, I’m not sure how that will work, especially considering their decisions like this that keep popping up. Plus, all the ads they’re adding everywhere.

Hopefully new leadership will keep Apple as Apple when it comes to privacy & quality but I’m no longer optimistic with the company overall. Hope that changes!
 
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triumvirate said:
This is part of why I’m always hesitant with the iPad-only lifestyle many on social media & YouTube seem to be promoting (kind of heavily, have to wonder who is financially pushing it).

Apple owns that store and puts whatever they want on it (and disallows anything they do not like). It is a completely locked system and for a main device, I’m not sure how that will work, especially considering their decisions like this that keep popping up. Plus, all the ads they’re adding everywhere.

Hopefully new leadership will keep Apple as Apple when it comes to privacy & quality but I’m no longer optimistic with the company overall. Hope that changes!
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Yeah, I've never understood folks that can do it (or want to do it).

It's crazy how much more capable, functional and quick to accomplish tasks I am on macOS.

I guess I'm just too much of a power user for the iOS/iPadOS only stuff.
 
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rp100 said:
I have some bad news for everyone: every app and website you use already does that.

And online chat support (for virtually every website): they can read what you’re typing and editing before you press “send”.
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Don't pop the kids rants when they are on a roll 🙂
 
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Apple Knowledge Navigator said:
How does this break your privacy?
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It's a bit of a stretch, but imagine if you accidentally typed in something that was sensitive, thinking another app had the focus, but instead entered it into the AppStore search bar? It will also be an issue if you accidentally pasted something in there. Edge case - I know - and there are other similar situations already in existence, but it's not great - they really shouldn't be logging this.

My cat has an amazing ability to walk across the keyboard in a very nonchalant way whilst at the same time managing hit copy and then app-switching and then paste...... what could possibly go wrong...?
 
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CarAnalogy said:
Personally I don't care because I avoid the App Store as much as possible. It's just one giant ad. Everything they said about improving software distribution when it was first announced has come full circle.

The App Store is now full of garbage and it's intentionally difficult to find what you want due to all the ads and scams.
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Imagine that, a store full of ads, almost like they are trying to sell you something.... in a store.

Are the scams you are talking about games that are basically just trying to get you to buy coins to actually play it or some other "scam"?

I never have trouble finding what I am after, I just use that little search button and type in what I am looking for.
 
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MacRumors said:
The post was accompanied by the above screenshot. "This is what the App Store sends to Apple (after I enabled personalized recommendations then) when I searched for 'Tim cook,'"
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Mysk of course left out the relevant bit.

Mysk reports that the lock he bought for his house is INSECURE! “See what happens after I’ve given someone a key to my house and told them to track what I do in my house. THEY TRACKED WHAT I DO IN MY HOUSE!”
 
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turbineseaplane said:
No more information is needed. They shouldn't be recording your "every tap", for any reason at all.
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Well, they do. Every letter tapped triggers and refines the search results.

Type G and you get all sorts. When you keep tapping until “game of” that’s when Game of Thrones appears.

Sure, they could wait for you to press Enter to trigger the search but they apparently decided to have some sort of live results filtering after every tap.
 
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It's not a surprise. Apple's first party apps has plenty of tracking already.

Third party apps are a minetrap off unchecked trackers.

That's pretty much why I stopped caring about apps.
 
turbineseaplane said:
No more information is needed. They shouldn't be recording your "every tap", for any reason at all.
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This is both blatantly incorrect and a very obtuse way to look at the situation. This is one of the examples that I described in my original post.

While it is always noble to advocate for privacy, as I and many others do, it is also worth understanding that you do not give up "personally identifiable data" when an anonymous unique ID is associated with your search on an app store.

The user experience of a given platform would be terrible if 100% of tasks were performed 100% locally. Companies need data in order to continue iterating on their products - even if that data includes where a user taps most frequently within an app. Even though you clearly disagree with it, this is one of those examples.

Unless this is being sent to Apple in such a way that gives up our personal information, it's not a breach of privacy. This is exactly why we need more information.

The last thought I will give on this is something that I previously stated that you seem to have chosen to completely ignore:

"""
It’s also iOS 27 beta 1. It’s very plausibly that disabling Personalized Recommendations will prevent this, but does not currently. It’s also very possible that in a later beta, Apple will introduce a toggle to turn this off - even more likely if people start complaining about this more.
"""

Jumping to conclusions. Point in case.
 
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turbineseaplane said:
Yeah, I've never understood folks that can do it (or want to do it).

It's crazy how much more capable, functional and quick to accomplish tasks I am on macOS.

I guess I'm just too much of a power user for the iOS/iPadOS only stuff.
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Honestly, at this point in my life, I could get everything I need done on my iPad. I can understand the appeal… but then Apple does things like this & suddenly tossing “personalized” ads into their native apps & bloated store that you have no alternative for (and can’t even block the ads). Safari still being a mobile browser is a big drawback of iPadOS to me too.

macOS is way more capable and quick with tasks though and even adding a keyboard to the iPad doesn’t allow it to catch up to the Mac efficiency levels.
 
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MacRumors said:


Last week, Apple introduced a new discovery feature for the App Store called Personalized Collections, or app recommendations based on individual interests and behavior. Apple pitched the announcement as another way for developers to have their app discovered, but there has already been some pushback from a privacy perspective.

app-store-keylogging-mysk@2x-scaled.jpg

App Store user analytics collected by Apple (Image: Mysk)​

The new tailored recommendations can appear on the Apps, Games, and Search tabs, and evolve over time based on a user's app usage and downloads. How Apple does this is through analytics data, but the extent of the information being captured by the company has set off warning sirens amongst some cybersecurity researchers.

Security researchers Mysk say that Apple logs "every tap" in the App Store that a user inputs in order to put together the recommendations. Quoting from a post shared on X (Twitter):
The post was accompanied by the above screenshot. "This is what the App Store sends to Apple when I searched for 'Tim cook,'" said one of the researchers. Responding to a reply, Mysk noted that the screenshot wasn't showing search results, but extensive analytics. "If you don't like Apple Music privacy options, you can stream music from Spotify, but where else can you download apps on the iPhone?" they added.

Mysk said the analytics in the screenshot were included in the personal data dump that individual users can request from Apple via privacy.apple.com.
Is capturing everything you do in the App Store app an intrusion of privacy? Opinions will differ. But there's an argument to be made for Personalized Collections to be opt-in, rather than the all-in feature Apple has rolled out. Let us know your opinions in the comments.

Article Link: Apple 'Records Every Tap' in App Store to Filter New Personalized Recommendations Feature
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Mysk has been misrepresenting the risks and privacy implications of what Apple does for several weeks now - ever since they launched a couple of apps. It seems like a bid to get attention from less informed folks, likely to get revenue in some way.

The most significant problems with their pronouncements are that they incorrectly state the impact of a feature that provides access to apps on your device to information and service that enable them to benefit the user. They are seemingly unaware of threat modeling and miss the point that when apps are required to go through security reviews, disclose what data is sent back to them, and side loading is not allowed, then it’s not necessary to add more layers of permissions and consent requests because the risks are mitigated.

They remind me of junior security analysts whose lack of understanding of risk assessment and management leads to, metaphorically, insisting that a $1000 safe is necessary to protect a trading card collection worth $10.

Some of what they say might make sense on devices running Android, or one of the other operating systems that allow arbitrary and untrusted apps to be installed on them.

It doesn’t apply to Apple devices.
 
MacRumors said:


Last week, Apple introduced a new discovery feature for the App Store called Personalized Collections, or app recommendations based on individual interests and behavior. Apple pitched the announcement as another way for developers to have their app discovered, but there has already been some pushback from a privacy perspective.

app-store-keylogging-mysk@2x-scaled.jpg

App Store user analytics collected by Apple (Image: Mysk)​

The new tailored recommendations can appear on the Apps, Games, and Search tabs, and evolve over time based on a user's app usage and downloads. How Apple does this is through analytics data, but the extent of the information being captured by the company has set off warning sirens amongst some cybersecurity researchers.

Security researchers Mysk say that Apple logs "every tap" in the App Store that a user inputs in order to put together the recommendations. Quoting from a post shared on X (Twitter):
The post was accompanied by the above screenshot. "This is what the App Store sends to Apple when I searched for 'Tim cook,'" said one of the researchers. Responding to a reply, Mysk noted that the screenshot wasn't showing search results, but extensive analytics. "If you don't like Apple Music privacy options, you can stream music from Spotify, but where else can you download apps on the iPhone?" they added.

Mysk said the analytics in the screenshot were included in the personal data dump that individual users can request from Apple via privacy.apple.com.
Is capturing everything you do in the App Store app an intrusion of privacy? Opinions will differ. But there's an argument to be made for Personalized Collections to be opt-in, rather than the all-in feature Apple has rolled out. Let us know your opinions in the comments.

Article Link: Apple 'Records Every Tap' in App Store to Filter New Personalized Recommendations Feature
Click to expand...
As a Certified Information Privacy Professional, this kind of crying wolf doesn’t benefit anyone. Of course user behavior analytics is going to log this type of information. The same happens on web sites and apps where the developer is concerned about the user experience. But unlike other companies, that data isn’t automatically shared with Apple. You have to give permission to share it, and can revoke that permission at any time.

If a user decides to use the Personalized Recommendations feature, of course data is going to be used to create those recommendations.
 
rp100 said:
I have some bad news for everyone: every app and website you use already does that.

And online chat support (for virtually every website): they can read what you’re typing and editing before you press “send”.
Click to expand...
So? Those companies don't market themselves as caring about our privacy. And it's also wrong anyway, so we shouldn't accept it

We should regulate and ban it
 
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CarAnalogy said:
They seem to define it more like client privilege. They don't want any OTHER company to know everything about you. Only them.
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Well I don't trust Apple any more than I trust a third party and no one else should either. It's self serving for Apple to put itself in this position because it creates an anti-competitive scenario that would rightly be struck down by any government that actually cared about abuse of monopoly or duopoly power
 
Everyone does this, but to be honest it does make search so latent in the app store, I'm reminded of a gen1 iphone running over edge.
 
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